


The Haunted Gap

by snowballjane (spycandy)



Category: Being Human
Genre: Gen, Written after the end of season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-21
Updated: 2011-06-21
Packaged: 2017-10-20 15:08:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/214072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spycandy/pseuds/snowballjane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two of Bristol's ghosts are under threat and Mitchell is haunted by his past</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Mitchell sat on the steps outside community centre and lit a cigarette in an effort to stop his fingers from constantly creeping towards the itch on his chest. The wound was entirely healed, of course, but Nina had snipped away the thick black hospital stitches just that afternoon – grumbling about people who didn't turn up for their outpatients appointments – and now he was uncomfortably conscious of the irritated skin.

“Good evening.” A head popped through the wall, right beside him. It belonged to a woman wearing a stiff lace cap and the neck, where it emerged from the brickwork, was surrounded by white ruffles. From the headwear and the ghost's haughty demeanour, Mitchell guessed that this was the Duchess of Beaufort – the ghost who had invited Annie to the evening's gathering.

“If you'd like to join us, young man, Mr Jackson has worked out how to open the fire exit without setting off the alarm,” she said.

“Oh no, I just came along with Annie for the walk,” said Mitchell. “I wouldn't want to intrude.”

“Stuff and nonsense. Come inside. Dear old Hilda always brings a cake and it would be good to have someone here who can eat it for once. The fire door is around the back.”

The Duchess's head vanished. Well, who could resist an invitation delivered in such a manner? Mitchell stubbed out the remains of the cigarette and got up. At the side of the building, a handsome ghostly horse had been tethered to a pay and display machine. It stamped the ground and whinnied as he passed, but didn't freak out as living horses tended to do when a vampire was near.

Further round there was a heavy fire door being held open by a gentleman wearing a fine frock coat and a long powdered wig. He eyed Mitchell with deep suspicion - apparently not everyone was as vampire-friendly as Her Ladyship.

Inside the hall, it looked like a hallowe'en party was in full swing. He could see Annie chatting in one corner with a young woman who was soaking wet and shivering. The wet and shivering didn't seem to bother her too much though, as the pair were shrieking with giggles. The Duchess was holding court, addressing a group that appeared to be made up of several nuns, a bloodied young man carrying an unsheathed sword and a tall hippie who swayed slightly on his feet.

Lounging in one of the stackable plastic chairs was a man dressed in riding gear. He didn't have a head, which added to the suspicion that he was the infamous owner of the horse outside. A set of plastic toys, no doubt belonging to a playgroup that used the building in the daytime, were apparently juggling themselves.

The be-wigged Mr Jackson was clearly going to make no further effort to welcome a vampire into the monthly gathering of the Bristol Society of Ghosts or introduce him to anyone. Having firmly closed the door behind Mitchell, he turned away and pointedly began a conversation with the faint outline of a young woman in what looked like Victorian widow's weeds. However, there was a cake laid out on a table at one end of the room, so Mitchell made a beeline for it.

“Mitchell...” whispered a soft voice, right in his ear, just as he bit into the biggest slice of what turned out to be excellent ginger cake. “Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you choke. It is Mitchell isn't it?”

The speaker was a man in heavy grey robes, but he was wearing the hood far enough back that Mitchell could see his bearded and lined face and smiling eyes. Once Mitchell had recovered his voice enough to confirm his name, the robed man introduced himself. “Brother Gregory. They call me the Grey Monk – I haunt the cathedral library. Yes, Gilbert always spoke very highly of you Mitchell, but most of us had our doubts. After all, relations with the vampire community have not generally gone well. However, the way you've helped young Annie there...”

Mitchell shook his head. “It's Annie who's helped me,” he insisted. “And I'm afraid that's cost her more than I could ever repay.”

“Ah,” said the ghost, “The door...”

He was clearly about to go on, but the Duchess was clapping her hands to bring the meeting to order and the ghosts pulled the chairs into a circle and sat down. Mitchell perched on the table at the back of the room.

“Ladies, gentleman and other manifestations,” she began, “Those of you who take the Bristol Evening Post will already be aware of the threat we face.” From the blank faces, it seemed that few of the ghosts present had much time for the local press. “Sylvester, please could you read the article out.”

Mr Jackson stepped forward and unrolled a copy of the newspaper, carefully placing his feet in an actorly pose and puffing out his chest as if about to declaim Shakespeare.

“Developers Hill Starr today confirmed plans to create a £70million new shopping complex in the city, creating hundreds of new jobs. Several derelict buildings will be demolished, including...” Here, Mr Jackson's performance faltered. The ghost swallowed hard and went on, “the former Crown Hotel.”

There was pandemonium. Whatever had been juggling the toys hurled them angrily at the wall. Several of the ghosts began (what was clearly well-practised) weeping, howling or screaming. The young man with the sword brandished his weapon at Mr Jackson, as if threatening him into retracting his words. Brother Gregory sunk his head into his hands, muttering, “Not again.”

As the Duchess attempted to calm the frantic spirits, Annie appeared at Mitchell's side and clutched at his arm. “Oh Mitchell, it's horrible. That hotel is haunted by two ghosts. It's like what you said would happen to me if Herrick burned the house down -- they'll have nowhere to go and nothing to tie them here.”

He took her hand from his sleeve and wrapped it in his, willing to do anything to take away that frightened look from her face. “We'll find a way to save them,” he promised.

>>>

The next morning, Roy the community centre manager surveyed the scene. The second Wednesday of every month it was the same, he'd put the chairs away in stacks and lock up, then come in next morning to find the chairs arranged in a circle, as if the centre was haunted by a community group with a regular meeting.

He didn't mind too much – at least they usually left him a cake. But this week the chairs were upturned, the toys were scattered around the floor and _someone_ had been eating his cake.


	2. Chapter 2

“So then Mitchell sticks his hand in the air and volunteers us to go down to the council offices and look at the plans. We're going to investigate whether there are any legal reasons we could stop the demolition.”

“Like newts?” asked George.

“Eh?” Annie's account of the evening faltered briefly at the interruption. “Well, it was the only practical suggestion anyone had, so Mitchell's the new hero of the hour. Even Sylvester Jackson had to admit it wasn't bad for a vampire.”

“That damp girl was so excited that she hugged me,” added Mitchell. “It was weird – she felt all wet, but when she let go, I was still dry.”

“Yeah, I think Miranda fancies you a bit,” said Annie. “I'd watch out there.”

The housemates were sitting around the kitchen table with a supper of tea and toasted crumpets that Annie had insisted on getting when they'd stopped at the 24-hour convenience store to pick up milk on the way home from the meeting. For the first time in days, it was just the three of them, and as George was still insisting that the others be on their best behaviour around Nina, it felt good to relax and be themselves.

Mitchell had to admit that Nina was coping remarkably well with everything she'd learned in the past week – but she hadn't exactly learned everything yet. Applauding Annie's ability to walk through walls was one thing, but she didn't need to know the gory details of Mitchell's past. George had convinced her that he was a 'reformed' vampire and she'd warily accepted her boyfriend's best friend more easily than he'd expected. But if she knew what had happened with Lauren...

“Are you sure it's a good idea to get involved in all this?” asked George, sounding worried. “I mean, we're only just recovering from taking on Herrick.”

“We can't just abandon those ghosts,” said Annie, crossing her arms and glaring at George's crumpets.

“Anyway, it's Bristol City Council, not an evil vampire conspiracy,” said Mitchell. “Ordinary people campaign against planning permission all the time.”

“Fine, count me in for banner-waving. Save our Haunted Hotel!”

>>>

Lauren's memorial tree was covered in tiny buds, about to burst into frothy white blossom. Around its base a few plastic flowers and weather-beaten laminated photos were all that remained of the tokens placed there months ago by her friends, the first time she had died.

Mitchell wondered whether he should have brought something, some kind of offering of belated apology and thanks. But what? Tearing open a vein and scattering drops of blood around her tree would be a bit melodramatic, but what had Lauren ever asked of him but blood and that final agonising plea to be set free?

That thought brought him to Josie, who had done her best to make killing her easier for him. Saving him gave some meaning to her otherwise cruel fate, she had whispered to him. He could spare her the lingering painful final hours her cancer would bring. The world was a darker place without her, but at least her could remember her with warm nostalgia and gratitude.

And then there was Herrick and that was way too complicated for words, wrapped up in ninety years of something more than friendship and more than kinship. He couldn't be sorry that George had killed Herrick, any more than he could possibly explain to his friends about the aching loss he felt for the vampire who had threatened to destroy them both.

It was hard to even remember the time when Herrick wasn't a part of his world and not just because it was so long ago. Before Herrick, he'd been human. Before Herrick there was death and loss on a scale no human should ever have to cope with. Yes, that was far too hard to remember.

It was better to keep moving, to keep doing. And right now what he needed to be doing was meeting Annie at the council offices.

>>>

The entrance lobby of the city council planning department had an imposing amount of dark wood panelling and a couple of drooping flower arrangements. High above the reception desk, the portrait of a balding man in mayoral robes gazed upon the queue with a supercilious frown.

“So what do we do?” Annie hissed into Mitchell's ear. He could tell from the way she was fidgeting with her long grey sleeves that the grandiose surroundings were making her nervous and he wished he himself was more certain that he knew what they were doing. Dealing with officialdom, a bribe here, a funny handshake there, had always been Herrick's forte. “I think we just...”

“Next!” The abrupt shout summoned them to the front of the queue.

“We'd like to see the plans for the new shopping centre please,” said Mitchell. The woman looked blank. “The one that was mentioned in the Evening Post?” he added, briefly hoping that it had all perhaps been misreported and there were no plans after all.

“Oh. Second room on the right. Next!”

Beyond the grand lobby, the corridors of city power were rather similar to the ones at the hospital, unremarkable drab walls and grim lighting that made everyone look dead – whether they were or not. In the second room on the right, architectural plans were pinned up on the walls and on a series of folding grey display boards. The shopping centre drawings took up one whole side of the room and were accompanied by glossy laminated artists' impressions of before and after the development, in which the shabby hotel was replaced with a glass-fronted designer shopping emporium, sketched shoppers strolling out laden with bags.

They were the only people in the room, which had a generally unvisited air. But as they stood in silence reading the developer's “vision statement”, a woman wearing a severe blue suit and carrying a clipboard stepped in through the door.

“You're here to look at the shopping complex plans?” she asked, seeming slightly puzzled at their interest.

“That's right,” said Mitchell.

“Oh good. Can I take your views for the public consultation?”

Well this was easier than expected, thought Mitchell. The council was actually asking them for their opinion.

“We're concerned about the buildings that are being demolished,” he said. “We think the area has a lot of vital local history.”

“Oh I don't think that's the case,” said the planning woman breezily. “English Heritage and the Victorian Society were quite happy and there's a report from the archaeological unit saying there's nothing important in the area.”

“And what about the people who live there?” snapped Annie.

The planning woman looked irritated at that. “The squatters in the hotel, you mean? Well, they'll be evicted, of course. We can't stop regeneration for a few people who won't move on.”

Behind the woman, the presentation boards started to sway. Mitchell put a calming hand on Annie's arm.

“It's not always so easy to move on,” muttered the ghost.

“Well, I'm sure every effort will be made to resettle them. Now, what do you think of the public transport options proposed?”


	3. Chapter 3

“Argh! We were useless. We more or less ended up saying we thought the new shops were a good idea, so long as the developers invest in improving the pavements.”

“Well, the pavements around there do need sorting out,” said George as his two dejected housemates slumped on the sofa and groaned.

“We need to go and see the ghosts at the hotel,” said Mitchell. “How come they weren't at the meeting anyway?”

“I think they're like I was at first, you know. They can't leave the place where they died. The Duchess has been there to see them. She looks out for rumours of hauntings and visits everyone she can find. She's kind of amazing really.”

“Did they die together then?” asked George.

“No, Sarah died in 1917 but Monty wasn't killed until 1950. He was murdered.” The words 'like me' went unspoken, but Mitchell saw the flash of anger in Annie's eyes. No wonder she was so determined to defend this ghost who had shared her own fate.

“How did Sarah die?” he asked.

“The Duchess was a bit vague and disapproving about that, which I think means it was suicide. Poor woman, she must have wanted out of this world so badly, but instead got even more stuck here.”

The trio sat in silence for a minute. “Tea anyone?” said Annie at last.

>>>

“So we're breaking into a derelict hotel in order to meet some dead people?” said Nina, for about the third time, on the walk to the Crown Hotel the next day.

“Yes, George really does know how to show a girl a good time,” said Annie, and the two women laughed as George um-ed and er-ed and flailed at the teasing until they rounded the final corner and took in the woebegone sight of the haunted building.

The hotel's lower windows had been boarded up with plywood, onto which was stencilled Hill Starr's bright green logo. A number of other, less corporate things had also been daubed or sprayed onto the boards, including the slogans, “We can't live in designer handbags” and “Hands off our home”.

“Over here,” called Nina, pointing out where the boards weren't properly fastened over the old staff entrance. All four of them gathered in front of the spot and then hesitated. The hotel did look sinister and forbidding. It was no wonder the council were happy to see it demolished.

“Oh, come on,” said Mitchell after a moment, with a confidence he didn't entirely feel. “There's nothing in there that's going to be any scarier than us.”

He took hold of the rough edge of the loose board and, with George's help, pried it open, so that there was a big enough gap to squeeze through. But when he tried to step forward into the gloomy interior, he met an invisible wall of resistance.

“Oi!” The shout came from somewhere deep inside the hotel. “Who're you? What d'you want?”

“We just want to come inside,” Mitchell called into the darkness. “Is that all right?”

“Not bloody likely,” said the voice, as its owner appeared in the thin shaft of light from the makeshift entrance. He was a tall, clean-shaven young man in jeans and a paint-flecked shirt. “Who the hell are you? Bailiffs?”

“We – we're making a TV show about haunted houses and, er, hotels,” suggested George, his uncertain tone undermining what might otherwise have been a marked improvement in his improvised lying skills.

“ _Right_. Where's all your kit then? Cameras and that.”

“We're just location scouting at the moment,” said Nina, backing up the lie with almost as little conviction as George. “So have you, er, seen any ghosts?”

The young man frowned and hesitated for a fraction of a moment before shaking his head. “No, no ghosts here. Just penniless artists and performers trying to scratch out a living. Now, if you'll excuse me I have a backdrop to finish painting before the real bailiffs come to turf us out.” He sounded more weary than annoyed. “And now I'll have to find some way to secure this door.”

“Oh, for pity's sake,” said Annie, stepping up to the neighbouring boards. “Look, we're here to see Sarah and Monty.”

As she finished speaking, she stepped straight through the boards and the wall into the hotel.

“Oh,” said the scenery painter, with remarkable calm, given what he had just witnessed. “Why didn't you just say so?”

“You know the ghosts then?” asked George, trying to peer past Mitchell, who still filled most of the gap they had opened.

“Oh, come on in, the rest of you. I presume you can't all walk through walls, or you wouldn't be wrecking the place pulling the boards off. I'm Anton, by the way. Stage manager, artist and drummer.”

It was probably a good thing that the multi-talented Anton didn't realise that Mitchell could not, in fact, have walked through even the gap in the boards without his invitation, let alone the wall. It was a relief to feel that invisible obstruction disappear.

Once everyone was inside, the squatter led the way through several dark rooms filled with shabby old-fashioned hotel furnishings. “The guy – Monty, you said? He sits at the back of rehearsals sometimes,” said Anton, as they reached the bottom of a staircase. “Chantelle tried to talk to him – she's into spirits and auras and all that – but he always disappears.”

“And Sarah?” asked Annie. “Have you seen her?”

“Dan said he saw a woman up on the fourth floor. Really creeped him out. We thought he was probably high at the time, but it's certainly weird and chilly up there. Okay,” he paused at the top of the first flight of stairs. “I'll be through here if you need me. If you run into anyone human upstairs, tell them Anton let you in. Come and find me when you're finished and I'll let you out the proper way.”

He pushed through a glass panelled door, through which they glimpsed a large hall full of activity. Then the door swung closed, leaving just the four of them on the stairs.


	4. Chapter 4

“Monty! Sarah! Yoohoo! Anyone here?” Annie's voice moved along the corridor, coming first from behind one door, then another as she took the direct route from room to room. “Hello! No, nothing, no-one... oh, oops, sorry!”

She reappeared in the corridor, looking flustered. “Naked man,” she squeaked, pointing at the door. “Not a ghost.”

“Is someone there?” called out a voice behind the door. There followed some baffled muttering, but the naked squatter must have concluded that he was mistaken, as the hiss of a shower started up soon afterwards. The four investigators turned towards the second corridor on the first floor, which ran at right angles to the first.

“Hello.”

The ghost floating above the threadbare carpet of the corridor was a slight man in early middle age, with receding fair hair and a world-weary expression. He was wearing tweed trousers and a white shirt with its sleeves rolled up to the elbows and the top button undone. Although they could see him quite clearly, they could also see right through him.

“Oh,” said Nina to Annie. “I thought they'd look normal, like you.”

George coughed his disapproval of this lapse in good manners. He stuck out a hand in greeting. “Hello. Monty I presume. I'm George, this is Mitchell, Annie and Nina. We're here about the building being demolished.”

The ghost looked around wildly, as if expecting the walls to crumble straight away. “Demolished!” he wailed, becoming significantly less substantial. “But...”

“Well done, George,” said Nina. “Break it to him gently.”

Monty was only just visible in the air of the corridor, but Annie reached out and patted the faint outline of a shoulder. “It's going to be all right,” she said. “We're here to help.”

Annie gradually soothed the ghost back to visibility with vague promises that they'd somehow be able to make things all right. He grasped her hand and his dismayed expression brightened at the solid connection between them, until Annie shied away from the tight grip. “Sorry,” he said, letting go. “I haven't been able to touch or talk to anyone but Sarah in such a long time.”

Annie took his hand back in hers, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Oh yes,” she said. “Where is Sarah? We need to talk to her as well.”

“She'll be in room 405, most likely. She doesn't leave much. It's on the top floor. But don't all go at once, you'll scare her.”

“I'll go,” offered Mitchell. “Why don't you all find an empty room and Annie can bring Monty up to speed on what's happening to the hotel?”

>>>

Mitchell tapped on the dark wood door of room 405. When there was no answer, he knocked again, calling out, “Is Sarah there?

The door handle twisted and the door swung open by itself, allowing Mitchell to step into the apparently empty room, which had an unnatural chill, despite the sunlight spilling through the dirty window. Not that a vampire was bothered by unnatural chills, of course. He shivered as goosebumps ran up his back.

“Hello? Sarah? Monty said this was your room.”

The door slammed closed behind him.

“We've come to help. My friends and I... I'm Mitchell by the way... the building's going to be... well there's a plan for new shops and...” He tailed off, feeling a little ridiculous trying to break bad news to an empty room.

“They're going to knock it down aren't they?” said the woman standing by the window, making Mitchell jump. She hadn't just appeared in a blink, as Annie often did at home. It felt more as if she had been there all the time he had been in the room, but he hadn't been looking properly. “I can see the construction company hoardings Mitchell. I'm not daft.”

Mitchell stared. The ghost could not have been more calm and matter-of-fact, but the sight of her had made his throat run dry.

“That... that uniform...” he croaked. Of course. Annie had said 1917, but he hadn't thought about what that meant. “You were a VAD.”

Sarah looked down at her neat white apron with its red cross across her chest and nodded. “I was stationed at Beaufort War Hospital. The hotel was used as digs for the staff.”

“Oh,” said Mitchell. Then she'd treated wounded soldiers. Maybe men he'd...

“It wasn't suicide you know,” she added abruptly. “I know everyone thinks so, but it was an accident.

“I'd just switched to working the night shift, and I found it really hard to sleep in the daytime. I'd just lie there with the curtains closed and my mind full of other people's blood and fever and dying words... So one morning, I took some sleeping stuff from the ward. I was out like a light as soon as my head hit the pillow, but the nightmares... the men.

“Maybe the drugs were stronger than I thought, I don't know really. I woke up to find my roommate shaking me and screaming – I thought the place must be on fire. But when I sat up, she was still shaking someone lying on the bed. And when I looked around, well, I understood what had happened.” There was a small hitch in Sarah's voice as she finished.

“And you've been here ever since?”

“Well, where else was I going to go? I tried going back to the hospital, but it was even worse than when I was alive. Some of the patients could see me -- they'd reach out to me, pleading, but I couldn't help them. There wasn't anything I could do. One of them tried to grab at my arm – his hand went right through me. He looked so scared. After everything he must have seen, he looked so scared of me. I backed away, trying to tell him that I was sorry, but the ward faded in front of me and I was back here. I always end up back here.

“I can move around within the hotel, but if I stop concentrating on being somewhere else, then, whoosh, back to room 405. I hate this room, these four wretched walls. Let them tear them down! Would that put an end to this? Would I just disappear?”

“You wouldn't be here like you are now,” said Mitchell.

“Good.”

“No! It's not good Sarah. You deserve a proper death. A proper ending. We need to find out what you left unresolved and put your spirit to rest.”

He really meant it – it wasn't just a task he'd taken on for Annie any more, or something to do to keep his own mind from grief. It was a chance at last to steal something back from the war that had already taken so much.


	5. Chapter 5

“Vampire?” asked Sarah after a long pause. “Sorry, I only just realised. You're not human are you? That's why you can see me.”

“Yeah, vampire,” said Mitchell.

“You're not like the others I've met. Oh, we get all kinds staying here,” she added in response to his surprised look. “Mind you, they're usually too busy attempting to get their next meal undressed and into bed to notice me. Oh! What's wrong?”

Mitchell swayed on his feet as memories awakened and spooled out of control. So many scenes like the ones the ghost had witnessed, recollections of blood and lust. But then back and further back. Before Herrick.

“I thought I'd saved them. I thought it was a sacrifice worth making,” he blurted out. It was something of a non-sequitur, but it had been bubbling up from the moment he had recognised the nurse's uniform and realised that Sarah might have some understanding of what it had been like. It wasn't something he could have talked about with George, even if he'd wanted to awaken the long-buried horrors. You needed to have been there – and there was almost no one left who had been.

“Who?” asked Sarah.

“My men. Do you know how many of them actually made it home? Two.”

“You were...? You were in the Great War.” Sarah paused, working it out. “You were alive then?”

“At first. And then I was offered a choice.”

“You saved two people then,” said Sarah, reaching out to him. Her fingertips brushed through his arm, insubstantial but cold. “That's more than most of us ever managed.”

Mitchell shook his head. “Joe Walker stepped out in front of a tram in 1921. They said at the inquest that it was because he'd been deafened by shell fire. He didn't hear it coming.” Mitchell shrugged, he'd never been sure whether that explanation was really convincing. Or whether it mattered. The war had got Joe in the end, either way.

“And the other man?” Sarah's voice was a soft plea, but he could give her no tale of happy grandchildren. His face was wet with tears.

“He died in jail in '27. Killed himself before his trial for killing his wife. All those times he'd said how much he wanted to get back to her. She'd have been better off if he'd died in that wood.”

“I'm so sorry,” said Sarah. “It must have been hard when you found out.”

“Oh, I laughed my socks off at the time. I was so high on the glory of death – the pure irony of it! What a noble fool John Mitchell had been to offer his life for theirs!”

A cold touch brushed his cheek. “And yet here you are on a noble, foolish quest to save us from demolition,” whispered Sarah. “We died in that war, Mitchell, and yet somehow we're the ones still here to remember it. A nurse who never saved a single casualty and a soldier who gave his men one more chance to survive.”

>>

The conversation on the first floor was getting nowhere. Monty had never mastered the art of haunting anywhere beyond the immediate vicinity of the hotel and seemed to have been a fairly ineffective spirit even inside it, since he could rarely get anyone to see him.

“Of course, I can move things around if I concentrate, but there's only so often you can play the floating hairbrush prank before it gets terrible tedious,” he said with a small sigh. “It was ever such a relief when they installed televisions in all the rooms. At least I could keep up to date on the world outside.”

Nor did he have any idea what unresolved issue was keeping him there.

“The Duchess said you were murdered,” said Annie. “Surely that must be something to do with it.”

“But that had nothing to do with me!” protested Monty. “The murderer got the wrong hotel room.”

“Fuck, that's unlucky,” said Nina. “Murdered in a case of mistaken identity.”

“No one would have _wanted_ to murder me,” added Monty, sounding rather morose about his lack of personal murderability. “I was never a bother to anyone. No one much ever really noticed me when I was alive either.”

“Hiya!” A pale face topped by bright pink hair popped around the edge of the door, interrupting the ghost's attack of self-pity. “Anton sent me to find you. We're having lunch downstairs, if you'd like to share.”

Although only half of the room's occupants were corporeal enough to eat, all four of them followed the young woman towards the hotel's grand dining room.

“I'm Chantelle, by the way,” she told Annie as they walked down the stairs. “Anton said you're some kind of supernatural social services, rehoming ghosts and that kind of thing.”

“Oh we're not anything official,” laughed Annie, who was charmed by the squatters' cheerful open-mindedness about the supernatural. “But, er, our last job involved thwarting a vampire scheme for world domination.”

“You're kidding!”

“I'm really, really not.”

“Hello again,” said Anton, holding up a ladle full of veggie stew. “Can you eat?”

“They can't, but we certainly can,” said George, accepting a steaming bowl and tucking straight in.

“They? We? Hold on, there's only three of you.”

“Monty's come down with us,” said Annie, wondering for the first time why Nina was able to see a ghost who had such trouble projecting to other humans. Perhaps being around Annie, George and Mitchell so much had sensitised her to spirit presences.

“Where is he?” asked Anton.

In answer, Monty picked up two spare spoons and waved them in front of him. Anton stared. “That's...” he tailed off before remembering his manners. “Good to meet you at last Monty,” he said, addressing the spoons, which looked rather peculiar to those who could see that Monty was holding them out at arms' length. “Dave-O, can you see this,” he added, turning to the next young man in the queue, whose eyes widened with delight.

“Bloody hell, now that's a special effect I could use!”


	6. Chapter 6

They had agreed to return the next day, partly in case anyone had a brilliant idea overnight for saving the hotel, but also so that Annie could interpret for Monty, who had been cast in the squatters' play. George and Nina had excused themselves to go to work, but promised to call if inspiration struck, so it was just Annie and Mitchell who now walked towards the hotel.

Annie studied Mitchell as they walked. He had returned from the hotel's upper floors red-eyed and hoarse-voiced the previous afternoon, but a little of the tension he had been carrying ever since the showdown with Herrick seemed to have lifted. All he would say about the ghost was that she knew about the demolition and that he wanted to help her.

At the boarded up doorway, Annie popped her head through the wood to call out for someone to open up, but when Dave-O appeared to let them in, they could tell something was very wrong.

“Eviction notice arrived,” confirmed Anton. “We could make a stand, but it won't help. We're bringing forward the play to tonight – some of the guys have already gone into town with flyers, but we could use your help with rehearsal.”

>>

The accident happened in the early afternoon. One minute one of the teenaged stagehands was standing on a ladder using a power tool, the next there was blood everywhere – all over the girl's white blouse, all over the stage, rushing in Mitchell's ears.

“We need a first aider!” shouted out Chantelle, kneeling beside the fallen girl. “Oh god, what do we do? Rest, ice, compression, elevation... no that's sprains. Someone call 999. Don't die Alison!”

“Sarah!” shouted Mitchell.

The ghost appeared instantly, looking far more prim than she had in her own room, with her hair tied up in a tight bun and a stiff cloth nurse's cap pinned on top of it. She acknowledged Mitchell with a bare nod before turning all her attention to the girl lying on the stage and calling out instructions.

“Sarah says to put your hand on...”

“This is hopeless,” interrupted the pink haired young woman. “Can't you just do what she says?”

“I can't be around blood.”

“This is no time to be queasy,” snapped Chantelle.

“Vampire.”

Chantelle shot him a sharp look and he knew from her slight twitch of shock that his eyes were black enough to make that convincing. “Huh. Okay, tell me what to do.”

With Mitchell passing on instructions, while he tried not to look at the pooling, sticky red mess on the stage, Sarah talked Chantelle through making a tourniquet to stop the bleeding.

“Good job,” said one of the paramedics, as he picked up his end of the stretcher ten minutes later. “It's an old-fashioned technique, weird that you'd have learned it these days, but it's saved her life.”

Mitchell looked up at Sarah, who had clasped both hands to her mouth. Her eyes were shining, focused on a door that had appeared in the hotel's ornate wood panelling.

“Ah,” she said at last. “I finally saved one.”

She walked over to the door, placing her hand on the brass plate, before glancing back over her shoulder, smiling and confident. “Thank you Mitchell. Look after yourself.”

And then she was gone.

>>

“She could have stayed to see my performance,” grumbled Monty and Annie suspected that he was only half-joking. In a single day, the shy, retiring ghost had become a total luvvie, no doubt thanks to all the attention he was getting from the cast and crew.

After weeks of struggling with invisible wires and sleight of hand, Dave-O had been so thrilled by the potential for special effects that he had written several extra scenes making use of Monty's talents. Despite the difficulties of communicating, the actors had adopted their mysterious new castmate with enthusiastic kindness, as well as hints and tips for handling stagefright. Now the two ghosts were waiting in the wings for his first cue in the actual performance.

Despite only having a single day's notice to sell tickets, a good crowd had turned up, filling all of the dining chairs that weren't too wobbly to be sat on. Since they expected to be forced out the next day anyway, the squatters had removed the boards from the hotel's grand entrance just as the first audience members arrived.

“Break a leg,” hissed Annie as the line for Monty's entrance was dreadfully over-acted by Morag. The ghost ran onto the stage carrying a large wicker basket. The audience's amazement was audible from backstage.

Monty was a surprising superstar. Despite only being able to act by floating objects around the stage, he had perfect instincts for when to ham it up and when to leave the audience wanting more. His comic timing was spot on, causing more than one of the actors to almost corpse on-stage by wiggling a mop and bucket.

When the cast went out to take their bows at the end, Monty took on the mop to make it bow in his place, but there was one final surprise for the audience, as the faint outline of a plain man in rather old-fashioned clothing shimmered in front of them for a moment and took his bow.

The curtain fell for a final time and as the rest of the cast dashed offstage the two ghosts turned around slowly, knowing what they were going to see. Where there had previously only been a facsimile of a door on the painted backdrop, there was now a real one.

“Exit stage left,” said Monty. “Tell everyone thanks. It was incredible to be centre stage, just once.”

And then he was gone.

>>

“What will you do now?” Mitchell asked Anton over drinks in the hotel bar, restored for one night to its former purpose.

“We'll find another place. Put on another show. It's what we do.” He laughed. “It'll be hard to top this one though. What about you two? More ghosts to save? Or is it protecting Mermaids from pollution next?”

“I don't know,” said Mitchell, wondering for a moment about the water quality in the Severn. “But there's bound to be something.”

The End


End file.
